XVII. HOME AGAIN,

XVIII. A FAREWELL CHAPTER,




LUCY RAYMOND.

I.

_Miss Preston's Last Sunday_.

"Tell me the old, old story
Of unseen things above--
Of Jesus and His glory,
Of Jesus and His love."


The light of a lovely Sabbath afternoon in June lay on the rich green
woodlands, still bright with the vivid green of early summer, and
sparkled on the broad river, tossed by the breeze into a thousand
ripples, that swept past the village of Ashleigh. It would have been
oppressively warm, but for the breeze which was swaying the long
branches of the pine-trees around the little church, which from its
elevation on the higher ground looked down upon the straggling
clusters of white houses nestling in their orchards and gardens that
sloped away below. The same breeze, pleasantly laden with the mingled
fragrance of the pines and of the newly-cut hay, fanned the faces of
the children, who in pretty little groups--the flickering shadows of